NASHVILLE, Tenn. — It’s official. Major League Soccer will be kicking off in Nashville in 2020, which is when the team was hoping to get into the mix.
“I think we always had in our minds it would be 2020. It was certainly our hope and it’s certainly the date we’d pin most of our planning to,” Ian Ayre, CEO of Nashville’s MLS team, said.
Once Major League Soccer officials made the starting time official, Nashville’s MLS franchise announced that they would play their first season at Nissan Stadium, home of the Tennessee Titans.
“I’m looking forward to seeing Nashville soccer fans fill that stadium and make that noise and then get ourselves all warmed up and all ready to create our own noise in our own home,” Ayre said.
While numerous MLS teams share a stadium with NFL teams, having a soccer-specific stadium was an important part of the selection process for MLS expansion teams.
Ayre said as a soccer purist himself, he knows there is no better alternative than having a stadium built specifically for the sport.
“Getting in your own venue that is very soccer specific – you know, you’re tighter to the pitch, the crowd is bigger and noisier and a little bit of a different atmosphere, so being in a venue that’s specifically built for that, you can’t beat that.”
The plan is to have the MLS stadium at The Fairgrounds completed in time for the 2021 MLS season, and while construction is underway at The Fairgrounds in preparation of the stadium, the MLS franchise has been hard at work on other aspects of the team, such as sponsorship, the name, and colors of the team.
“This name, this logo, identity, hopefully is around forever, so it’s important to get that right,” Ayre explained. “It’s important that it reflects who we are and who we want to be, and there’s some fantastic work on that, and more news on that and other things as the days roll by.”
While 2020 will bring plenty of soccer excitement to Nashville, 2019 is also expected to be an exciting year as Nashville SC enters into it’s second season in the USL.
Fans who get season tickets with Nashville SC will receive priority when tickets go on sale for Nashville’s MLS team.
